Andy Slaughter MP, currently chair of the Commons justice committee, has been appointed solicitor general. He will deputise for the attorney general Ellie Reeves KC MP and is expected to deal with unduly lenient sentences.
Slaughter was called to the bar in 1993 and has been an MP since 2005. He held shadow ministerial posts while Labour was in opposition.
Catherine McKinnell MP has been made a minister of state in the Ministry of Justice. A former practising solicitor, she was first elected to parliament in 2010 and was minister for school standards at the Department for Education from July 2024 to September 2025.
Sarah Sackman KC MP keeps her job as a minister of state in the Ministry of Justice.
Baroness Smith of Cluny KC remains advocate general for Scotland, a law officer of the UK government.
Lord Timpson OBE has left the government — although at time of writing he is still listed as prisons minister at the Ministry of Justice.
Comment
Sackman provides a measure of continuity at the Ministry of Justice. Even if the jury reforms in the Courts and Tribunals Bill are dropped, she will be able to see the lees controversial parts of the bill through the Commons. But the ministerial line-up at the Ministry of Justice is not yet complete.